Night was about to fall, and everyone began putting away their tents. Caleb had no choice but to sleep in the communal space with the stinky men.
He had to admit, he was starting to miss the days when he shared a tent with Kai'Sa and Yuumi.
With two rough guys powered by fury in the same space, Caleb truly could not stand the smell.
This was unbearable!
"Forget it. I'm going outside for a walk."
Taking advantage of the night, Caleb slipped out of the tent.
With his physique, even a brief nap after dinner was enough for him to stay energetic through an entire day.
Under the cover of night, Caleb wandered around outside the tents.
From his original tent came one snore after another, so Caleb simply left it behind and strolled through the village to clear his head.
Honestly, if prey were not so hard to catch at night, Caleb would have wanted to run up the mountain right then and chase an animal around for fun.
It would count as exercise.
However, in the village lit only by a handful of torches, Caleb suddenly heard a burst of laughter.
The laughter was hearty, yet also somewhat restrained.
It seemed they were trying not to disturb the people here while they rested.
"Those were truly glorious years."
"Yes. A wonderful era."
The voices sounded old, yet they also carried the sense that these men had not lost their edge.
Then came a long silence.
Caleb, crouched outside the door, also felt somewhat stifled. He did not know whether he should keep listening or turn around and leave.
"Hmm… I've been found?"
Just as Caleb was spacing out, the door had already opened.
"You're not sleeping in the middle of the night?"
Old Lind looked at Caleb, his eyes full of suspicion.
Without exaggeration, Caleb had an illusion in that instant that this old man could kill him with one punch.
"I couldn't sleep, so I came out to clear my head."
Caleb simply told the truth. After all, he had already been caught eavesdropping. Playing clever now would be a bad idea.
"Go sleep early. Don't come near this place."
Without realizing it, Caleb had already wandered to the edge of the village.
He had no idea why these two were chatting in such a remote place so late at night.
To put it bluntly, someone could die here and no one would know.
The old man's words sounded less like advice and more like a warning.
"The person inside, is that the mage Ryze?"
Across the entire continent of Valoran, there were definitely many people with magical abilities.
However, among mages, there was one who could be said to have gone down in history.
Caleb was certain that basically every nation's history books would have this man's name recorded in them.
And not just in a few brief lines either.
As what could be called the strongest mage on the entire continent, Ryze had grasped part of the secrets of the runes. As a human, he had nearly touched the threshold of Tier 2.
"You know him?"
Lind was somewhat surprised. Then, after thinking about it, he felt it was not strange for Ryze, who traveled across the continent, to have become friends with a young man like this.
"Sort of…"
Caleb did not say that with much confidence.
If Ryze came over later and said he did not know him, Caleb could just use Shadow Step and bury himself in the ground.
"Then come in too."
Seeing that Caleb seemed to know Ryze as well, Lind's attitude softened quite a bit.
"He didn't confirm it? That's a little strange."
Although Caleb thanked him and entered the house, his nerves grew even tighter.
Ryze, sitting at the other end, looked at Caleb with some doubt.
"This pressure… as expected of him, I guess."
The moment Caleb entered the house, he felt as if he were sitting on pins and needles.
Ryze's seasoned gaze fell on him, and Caleb also felt somewhat uncomfortable.
"So hand it over already."
Lind's expression stiffened. He had not expected Ryze to remain this blunt even with a new guest entering.
"You know trolls are even hungrier in winter. If we lose that, how are we supposed to resist them?"
"Move, or simply die here."
Contrary to Caleb's expectations, Ryze's tone was extremely cold.
"Move? How are we supposed to move?"
Lind also grew agitated, completely ignoring Caleb, who was awkwardly stuck at the doorway.
"There are so many women and children! The trolls will follow the scent!"
"Without that power, many people will die!"
Lind had managed this village for so long. Of course he did not want the scene he described to happen.
"If a rune falls into the hands of someone with dangerous intentions, even more people will die."
"Compared to all those lives, these few women and children really don't weigh much to me."
Ryze's words were like an icy scale, cruelly and calmly weighing the lives on both sides.
"Then our glorious past should be burned too!"
Lind said in a low voice.
"Just like you burned those scrolls."
His eyes seemed to burn with anger, and even Caleb could feel the arcane energy in the air stirring restlessly.
The huge scroll was still behind Ryze. He had already raised both hands, ready to act.
"Both of you, wait!"
Caleb's shout pulled both of their attention onto him.
"Can you two consider the fact that there's a third person here?"
Looking at the power gathering between them, Caleb felt ominous from the bottom of his heart.
The kind of ominous feeling that suggested the entire village might be damaged.
"What you're talking about is a World Rune, isn't it?"
Caleb had roughly guessed it.
Only a World Rune could give an old village chief who seemed to have average talent the power to repel groups of trolls.
Ryze had probably come here to retrieve the rune.
Perhaps he had gathered all the others, so he wanted to completely seal this entire rune away.
But in a winter like this, handing over the rune practically meant the village would be wiped out.
The two had already been on the verge of attacking.
As long as one person's spell triggered, the other would quickly attack in return.
"You know about the World Runes too?"
This time, it was Ryze and Lind's turn to be shocked.
The man before them looked only in his early twenties, yet he actually knew about the World Runes?
"Sort of. I know a little."
Caleb did not say everything.
For example, the fact that he currently had a whole World Rune in his own hands.
"I have a few friends from the major tribes of the Freljord. They may be able to help."
"Heh… that has nothing to do with me."
Ryze's voice was still so cold that Caleb could not help lowering his opinion of him quite a bit.
"No tribe would be willing to come rescue a small village like this under the threat of the trolls' encirclement."
The old village chief shook his head and spoke helplessly.
"Then why didn't you leave this place earlier?"
Caleb could not help asking.
"You don't understand. At first, this village was only a place where a few people waited for death in despair."
"Now it has finally grown to this scale, finally gained stored grain, finally become able to leave…"
Lind's gaze dimmed somewhat. He had thought this peaceful life could continue forever.
He also knew that no one else fought them for the resources here. Because of that, the day of migration had been delayed by one day, then another.
But this man had returned.
"Mage Ryze, may I ask you a question?"
Caleb's eyes grew heavy, as if he had thought of something.
"Go ahead."
Ryze's voice remained still as an old well.
"If a huge boulder rolls down from the mountaintop, and on the left is a village with many people, while on the right are only a few travelers, would you let the boulder roll left or right?"
"Right," Ryze said without the slightest hesitation.
"If it were me, I'd smash the boulder."
Caleb's words plunged the entire house into silence once more.
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